All Blog Posts Tagged 'Software' (32)

You can poll virtually any salesperson, especially one that has worked in B2B sales. If you ask them about CRM, you'll get an almost unanimous response: "It sucks!"

Why is that?

Put yourself in a salesperson's shoes. You have traits and skills that many others don't have. You can talk to someone you've never spoken to before, gain rapport, and interest them in a product or service. If they're qualified and they have issues that your product or service will solve, you can…

It’s one thing to attract the best minds — it’s another entirely to hold on to them. Especially given the ever-widening shortfall between the need for skilled software developers and the lack of people to fill the demand for that role, it becomes harder — and more necessary — for companies to keep their valued developers on staff, with all the choices and incentives they have in the job market. Software companies need to do all they can to create an environment that keeps them engaged,…

Futurelabs CRM is among the new pioneers in sales software and advisers among small businesses. They spotted an issue among a vast majority of small start-ups and SME’s they need growth and growth equal qualified leads. The reason why this group of companies do not manage to grow is for the simple reason, without qualified leads it gets difficult to grow your business. When resources are scarce and time is in essence a scarcity, qualified leads and keeping these in order is…

When thinking about your IT department, words like “user friendly” and “responsive” are not the first that come to mind. More likely, it would be “unresponsive” or even “the department of no.”

Sadly, if you asked your IT department how they think they’re doing, they would say the same. A survey RES software conducted with IDG earlier this year noted that only 28% of IT leaders believe they are delivering on business needs effectively.

Every year millions of new users are experiencing the software for the first time. Thanks to expanding internet, smart mobile phones and easy to use devices like tablets millions of people are touching and using software for the first time. At the other end of the spectrum, current users of software are embracing software in ways that make them even more efficient (productivity software, home monitoring software) and raising the awareness about themselves (measured self) that is improving…

I admit to being NOT surprised why the global hardware industry is scrambling to survive. The reasons, more or less, emanate from the play-safe methodologies employed by the leading players of the industry. Maybe, they haven't received the memo that their archetypal, mainstream approach consistently fails to deliver because this age dictates innovation. But, not everything can be pinned on them.

A recent survey on FoxBusiness.com revealed small business owners collectively waste four billion hours of company time each year by spending too much time on back-end support functions and administrative tasks. This keeps owners from focusing on what’s important – their core business processes. The same survey said owners would like to spend…

In today’s interconnected world, APIs are more pervasive than ever. Software developers have long been using APIs to extend the value of their applications, leverage the functionality of other applications, and create entirely new platforms. In fact, APIs, most prominently REST with JSON, have become such big business growth drivers that many industry analysts label the opportunity “The API Economy.” What may not be obvious is that The API Economy is undergoing a radical shift that is…

When it comes to predicting the future of technology, we stink. I mean all of us. Pundits, journalists, analysts, etc. We are all limited and shortsighted in our attempts to predict what technology will eventually look like. Even those people who make their livings as futurists have a success average that, if they were professional baseball players, would get them kicked out of the major leagues.

A good example of this kind of prediction failure is found in a recent article by Harry…

When US Supreme Court justices start quoting Greek mythology you know you have a remarkable case on your hands.

Judge Stephen G. Breyer's "Scylla and Charybdis" analogy to describe the legal arguments that have stemmed from Australia-based Alice Corporation suing New York-based CLS Bank International, over allegations that the former's…

Unless you've had your head buried under a rock for the past year, you've noticed high-profile software systems are crashing left and right -- costing companies millions in maintenance costs and emergency patches. But as the glitches keep coming, we’re starting to see the true cost of these glitches rise to the surface: CIOs’ job security.

Peel the lid off any large global company and you’ll likely find a rat’s nest of software applications. It’s a mix of commercial apps such as ERP and CRM; various packages for finance, HR, engineering and purchasing; some home grown stuff in SQL, Oracle and Access; and let’s not forget the Excel spreadsheets -- you’ll definitely see lots of those.

“Death by one thousand cuts” is what it can feel like for employees who by “tradition” rely on dated tools and processes to get their work done. Consider Human Resources (HR). Like the enterprise IT organization, HR is a “hub” -- a shared service provider that fields requests ranging from simple benefits and payroll questions to on-boarding and off-boarding employees or handling complaints.

Good software today requires a high-quality user experience that is continuously built from the design to how it functions, performs and operates. As the world becomes more connected, sustaining users attention will require a continuous delivery of innovative software features and functions. To make good on this delivery, the role of the developer will need to evolve.

With the buffet of applications and mobile devices available, satisfying user appetites and commanding their…

For growing companies, the channel can be a great option, but without the proper infrastructure and support, resale may mean more trouble than benefit. Before launching a channel program, ponder the following questions to determine if it's the right choice for your company.

Does my company have the infrastructure to support a channel?

A business partner channel requires marketing, sales and technical support. It is important that…

There are hundreds of millions of products available today, with many of them available on the Internet, and the most immediate sources of information on that vast collection of products are Google and Amazon.

Today, Amazon and Google are most people’s first stop on the Internet for product information. However, Amazon is limited (even with its vast selection) to the products it has in its own catalog and in its marketplace of third party sellers. And Google is limited by the way it…

A multibillion dollar company, founded in 1932, grew to be the fourth largest toy company in the world by making a toy “brick” made of plastic that inspired millions of children to use their imagination. In the 1990’s, Lego hired creative talent to expand on the basic “brick” to include fashionable colors and realistic…

More than any other human activity, science has created the modern world, not only intellectually but materially too. Scientific discoveries beget new technologies, and these in turn make our lives healthier, more productive and more fun.

For some excellent examples, look no further than this year's Nobel Prize winners. Medical progress would grind to a halt without the kind of fundamental biology that earned James Rothman, Randy Schekman and Thomas Sudhof their Prize in Physiology or…